SOLEMNITY OF THE MOST HOLY TRINITY 2014

By Archbishop Gomez

Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels

June 15, 2014

So today is Father’s Day, so happy Father’s Day to all fathers and grandfathers! We have a special blessing for all of you later on in the celebration of the Mass. But, as you know, your role as fathers is very important — not only to your wives and your children, but also to our whole society.

As fathers, you are a beautiful witness to the love of God, who is our Father in heaven. So, I especially pray today — we all pray for you, especially that your love for you wives will always grow. And that you will always stay close to your children in love, following the example of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. Joseph.

So we are praying for you today and we thank God today for all our fathers — those who are living and those who have gone before us.

And it is a joyful day as we celebrate God’s love for us and especially the love of our fathers.

But today we are also celebrating the solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, which is a great mystery of our Catholic faith.

The Trinity is really the mystery of the entire universe because it is the mystery of the identity of God.

When we ask the question: Who is God? The answer is: the Trinity. God is one God in three Divine Persons — the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

This is the beautiful reality, the beautiful truth, that Jesus has revealed to us.

So God is not something that is out there — up in the sky. God is not an idea or a concept. God is a living God in three persons. And he, God, wants a living relationship with each one of us. God is love and he wants us to live in his love, in his rays, in communion with him. This is the beautiful mystery that we have to consider today.

God wants us to know him, he wants to share his life with us. And that’s why he sent Jesus into the world.

I have to share with you that I’m always amazed when I reflect on this. That the God, who is the creator of the universe, the God, who created the sun and moon and the stars and seas, the mountians and deserts. The God who created every living thing, the one who is all powerful, has all beauty — This God, wants to know me, wants to have a personal relationship with each one of us. It’s just beautiful, awesome, amazing.

So, in his divine plan, as we just heard in today’s Gospel, God sent his own son to be with us:

God so loved the world that he gave his only Son.

So he sends his only Son, the second person of the Blessed Trinity, to show this world the way to him. And he did it out of love. Love for each one of us in a personal way. God the Father and God the Son send the Holy Spirit also to be with us, as we pray every Sunday:

We believe in the Holy Spirit
The Lord the giver of life
Who proceeds from the Father and the Son

This is almost too beautiful to be true. But it is true. We can know God, because God wants to know us!

So, my brothers and sisters, we all need to grow in our friendship with God. We all have to find the way to have a personal relationship with each one of three Divine Persons.

We need to know God — as our Father who loves us. We need to know God — as the Son who comes to be our Brother and to walk with us. And we need to know God — as the Spirit who dwells in us so we can live as children of God.

In the second reading of today’s Mass, St. Paul is telling us that God is the God of love and peace. And he gives us this beautiful prayer, which is also a promise. He says, as we heard:

The grace of the Lord Jesus
and the love of God
and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.

This is the promise of the Trinity.

God who wants to be with us. So we need to reflect on it. Again, that God, the Most Holy Trinity, wants to have a personal relationship with us. And we need to find the way to do it — the practical way to do it. Maybe just making the sign of the cross more often:

In the name of the Father
And of the Son
And of the Holy Spirit

Maybe when we are going out or coming in, or just something happens, we need to find the way to be more aware of the presence of the Holy Trinity with us. Maybe also repeating the beautiful prayer of the Glory Be

Glory be to the Father
And to the Son
And to the Holy Spirit

It is true, think about it. God wants to be with me. Wow! Let’s find those little ways in which we can be more aware of that beautiful presence of God in our lives. Sometimes, what is useful to us, is to find a time to read the Gospels.

As you know, I like to think of the Gospels as Jesus’ Facebook page. Because in our Facebook pages there is everything, pictures of our family and friends, and that’s what the Gospel is all about. So if we spend a lot of time on our Facebook page, or looking at those Facebook pages of our friends and relatives, let us try and find the time to be looking at Jesus’ Facebook page. Let’s try it.

And let’s try to this week, to find the time to read some passage of the Gospel and pray about it. To really allow God to be more present in our lives. And in that way, we will find the best way to really have that personal friendship with God the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

If we do that, and we open our souls and our lives to the grace of God, especially the grace that comes to us through the Sacraments — the Sacrament of Reconcilication and the Eucharist, and if we try to keep imitating God’s love for us in our daily lives: God the Father, who is our creator and who loves us in a beautiful way. God the Son who has given his life for each one of us, who has sacrificed himself for us — try to imitate that — and God the Holy Spirit who is always inspiring us for what we are supposed to do, to find joy and happiness in our lives. Then we will be growing in our friendship with the most Holy Trinity.

What a beautiful challenge for each one of us this week and in our Christian life: understanding God’s presence and love for us and trying to work in growing in our love for God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

So today, let us pray for all our fathers and let’s ask Our Blessed Mother Mary to teach us how to grow in our friendship with God, who is our Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.